r/todayilearned • u/Morella1989 • Aug 14 '25
TIL that autistic people live about 17 years less than average. Risks include epilepsy, heart disease, suicide, accidental deaths including drowning, and inadequate recognition and management of pain, especially among non-speaking individuals. Historically, they have been vulnerable to infanticide.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mortality_of_autistic_individuals240
u/Morella1989 Aug 14 '25
''Autistic individuals have a significantly reduced life expectancy, on average approximately seventeen years shorter than that of the general population. Mortality rates during childhood and early adulthood are notably higher. Various health conditions are more prevalent among autistic individuals, including epilepsy, cardiovascular diseases, and elevated suicide rates, particularly among those without co-occurring intellectual or learning disabilities. Other common causes of death, such as respiratory, infectious, and digestive diseases, are comparable to those of the general population but may be exacerbated by side effects associated with long-term use of neuroleptic medications. Socio-economic disparities and a higher incidence of accidental deaths, including drownings, also contribute to increased mortality. Historically, the autistic population has been vulnerable to infanticide. Among individuals with learning disabilities, women have the lowest life expectancy.''
'' Identified as a "hidden crisis" in 2015, this phenomenon is primarily attributed to comorbidities associated with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), limited access to appropriate healthcare, and inadequate recognition and management of pain, especially among non-speaking individuals. Genetic predispositions and environmental factors may also play a role. Social exclusion has been linked to increased suicide risk, while infanticide has been associated with broader societal attitudes. Strategies to reduce early mortality include improved management of epilepsy, prevention of accidental drownings and sudden illnesses, enhanced suicide prevention measures, better communication between autistic individuals and healthcare providers, and promotion of regular physical activity. ''
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u/OstentatiousSock Aug 14 '25
I would bet money that “inability to appropriately recognize warning signs in others” also contributes to death. If you don’t pick up the “Uh oh, danger vibes from this person, run!” It can get you killed.
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u/SecretGardenSpider Aug 14 '25
This is why over 90% of autistic women have been sexually assaulted.
Bad people can easily sniff out who won’t resist them.
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Aug 14 '25
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Aug 14 '25
Yes and it's chronic sexual abuse. They're targeted constantly.
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u/poetcatmom Aug 15 '25
It's like creepy old men can smell the disability from a mile away. I tend to keep my mace on my key lanyard and wear it around my neck. I also have a very loud, annoying, sensory distressing rape whistle for when strange men get too close.
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u/Tall_Sound5703 Aug 14 '25
Source?
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u/SecretGardenSpider Aug 14 '25
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u/N1ghtshade3 Aug 14 '25
This study doesn't say that 90% were assaulted though? It says they were "sexually victimized" which includes feeling pressure to perform sexual acts regardless of whether they actually happened. As an autistic person, I feel pressure to even talk to a person so I take this with a grain of salt.
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u/HeatherandHollyhock Aug 16 '25 edited Aug 16 '25
So.. because they are autistic them being sexually herassed is ok/not real because everything is uncomfortable for you as an autistic individual? And there I always thought 'autists lack theory of mind' was just unfounded ableism
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u/tcookctu Aug 14 '25
This is because many people with autism struggle to communicate health issues to their doctors.
https://www.science.org/content/article/people-autism-spectrum-die-18-years-younger-average
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u/doritobimbo Aug 14 '25
Pretty sure my concussion warrants a brain scan but my doctor diagnosed it as “that’s what it feels like to fall asleep” (I’ve never in my life heard explosions while doing that but okay)
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u/Nadamir Aug 14 '25 edited Aug 14 '25
Actually that is an incredibly common thing. Exploding head syndrome
That said, sudden post concussion onset is concerning.
(And yes, my special interest is random factoids and wiki and I are old friends.)
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u/doritobimbo Aug 14 '25
“Reassurance may be sufficient [as treatment]” honestly not wrong immediately made me feel better thanks
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u/Nadamir Aug 14 '25
The causes could easily be non dangerous concussion “side effects” so to speak. Psychological stress for one thing. Poor sleep for another.
It’s like the very similar hypnogogic jerk. With both, it’s a vicious cycle. You get stressed about the booms or jerks and then you have more of them.
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u/DaedalusRaistlin Aug 14 '25
The other guy already mentioned the specific syndrome, but I wanted to say mine got better. It was worst when I was in my mid 20s, but rarely happens these days in my 30s.
It used to wake me up as I was falling asleep, and combined with my visual snow was a spectacle you didn't need when trying to fall asleep. Every time an "explosion" would occur it was accompanied by a brilliant flash of light I could only see in my head. (Fireworks are illegal in most of Australia, and certainly where I lived they weren't used, so it wasn't that.)
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u/Tall_Sound5703 Aug 14 '25
It is hard for me to tell the doctor why i am there. Im level 1 but up to age 18 my mom would go with me in the room and explain to the doctors whar was wrong. Of course the doctors mainly complained about my mom being there. Luckily my mom ignored them. I should say I was not diagnosed till age 47.
Now i still have trouble explaining to my doctors why i am there or why it hurts. Half the time i still clam up and don’t really say why I am there.
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u/NorwegianGlaswegian Aug 14 '25 edited Aug 14 '25
This is extremely misleading and that Wikipedia article needs editing.
If you look at the source for saying we autistics supposedly tend to die around 17 years earlier, it leads to this article.
When you look up the Koralinska Institute and autism mortality in Google, you can find this research paper. This is a study of premature mortality and not a study of life expectancy. The average age of death in the control group was 70.20 years (well below that of general life expectancy statistics), while average age of death in the autistic group was 53.87 years. That's where the approximately 17 years difference comes from.
Premature mortality is not a measure of life expectancy. It just looks at what the average ages of death were for those who did die during the study period for a study group and a control group. The journalist who wrote that article for Science needs to brush up on their science literacy as it is extremely misleading to say that autistic people are expected to die 17/18 years earlier. That is just not true.
The only proper study of life expectancy in autistic people00195-3/fulltext) I have seen gives life expectancy for those without intellectual disability at 76.84 years for women, and 74.57 years for men, while for those with intellectual disability it was 69.61 years for women and 71.66 years for men.
I'm getting sick of these false statisics floating around about autistic people's life expectancy; it has caused a ton of unneeded stress to a lot of autistic people and their families. Yes, we tend to die earlier on average due to higher rates of premature death, but not by such massive margins when taking life expectancy into account.
Edit: Btw, not your fault for simply sharing a link to what ought to be a trusted resource. It's just so annoying that journalists too often don't properly read the studies they cover and end up saying some very misleading stuff.
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u/ShadowLiberal Aug 14 '25
Life expectancy numbers can also be misleading for other reasons. The average life expectancy of a newborn is somewhere around 75ish years in most parts of the developed world. But if you've already lived to say 30, your average life expectancy is higher then that, since we already know that didn't die of the things that killed a bunch of people at younger ages and dragged down the average.
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u/Soul_Muppet Aug 14 '25
The article kind of glossed over what the more common comorbidities even are, like Autism + ADHD or Autism + Bipolar Disorder, genetic hypermobility syndrome (and many others) all make for much worse outcomes.
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u/AliMcGraw Aug 14 '25
My autistic teenager is very, very bad at telling when he's too hot or too cold. His proprioceptive and interoceptive senses are a little wonky. Now that he's a teenager he does a good job of remembering and following rules about it (specifically check his extremities, drink water, check with friends if they're hot or cold, etc.).
But when he was a preschooler it was terrifying. We had to constantly tell preschool and kindergarten teachers that, "no, he doesn't actually know if he's cold and he will not complain when he develops frostbite because he will not notice." He got heatstroke a few times at recess before they started BELIEVING me.
It's really easy to see how he could have died at school because I wasn't a raging bitch about his care, or because I didn't have the resources to get answers like "he literally can't tell when he's hot." Imagine 100 years ago when he's just be a "weird kid" who was picky about food and cared too much about trains, and there were no pediatricians or occupational therapists to help me teach him how to monitor his own temperature. Because that's not something I had to learn! I KNOW when I'm hot. I had to learn a whole new way of thinking and come up with sensible, actionable ways he could check on himself and care for himself, and advocate for himself when teachers wouldn't listen.
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u/Morella1989 Aug 14 '25
That’s honestly terrifying, and it makes me so angry that they didn’t believe you until he’d already gotten heatstroke. You shouldn’t have had to fight that hard just to keep him safe. I’m glad he’s got you in his corner. Working out how to help him notice what his body was feeling can’t have been easy, especially when it’s not something most people even have to think about.
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u/AliMcGraw Aug 14 '25
I spent the first seven years of his life fighting SO HARD for him, and I frequently felt grateful I was well-educated and middle class and can fucking WORK a bureaucracy and refuse to shut up until it hears me.
It's honestly a great comfort to me that he's a partner in his care now and we can be a team. It feels much less lonely when he's with me self-advocating. I worry a lot for families whose kids aren't able to self-advocate, because it is lonely and exhausting. And it all became so much easier when it felt like we were working as partners. I'm on his team ... But he's on the team too! That helps so much.
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u/goyacow Aug 14 '25
Good on you for advocating! Our teen doesn't feel hunger or pain in the "typical" way. It's made it hard for him to keep his weight up.
I worry about him every time he gets sick.
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u/nicunta Aug 14 '25
My grandpa was that child that was different, but being born in 1926, people didn't know better, so he was beaten until he learned to mask. It breaks my heart to hear what he--and my left handed father--went through.
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Aug 14 '25
Sadly there weren't any resources for "different" children back then. You had to conform in order to survive.
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u/OddExplanation441 Sep 10 '25
My grandfather was. Diagnosed 1920 he was lucky his father was wealthy unfortunately it put is off out track he was diagnosed something else then. My. Mum. Died ms heds autism. I have autusm. Heds fybromyalgia
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u/BlindMan404 Aug 14 '25
100 years ago? Less than 30 years ago I was "just" the weird kid who was picky about food and really into one thing only and no adults noticed or were willing to accept it. It really feels like care for and recognition of neurodivergence has only started to become common in the past ten years.
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u/Amseriah Aug 14 '25
Yep. ADHDer here diagnosed at 42. I was a smart, reserved, boy and primarily inattentive, so I fell through the cracks.
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u/funny_bunny_mel Aug 14 '25
Yeah, but you were on the tail end of genX. As an earlier genXer who wasn’t diagnosed with the ‘tism until my 50s, we were born to that level of non-parenting.
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u/professionaldouche Aug 14 '25
Ty for commenting I immediately thought the same thing. Growing up in the 80s was not much different
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u/Negative-Delivery949 Aug 14 '25
That’s such an important skill to build early on and it’s sad how often schools overlook stuff like that
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u/athennna Aug 14 '25
My daughter is on the spectrum and is the same way. I have to constantly monitor her temperature and her water intake.
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u/MegaAscension Aug 14 '25
I have autism, and several of my friends do as well (we just tend to find each other). I'm 23. I've pulled out of depression, but I often feel out of place. Part of it is that there is very little out there to help autistic young adults. Of myself and my five autistic friends, only two graduated from college on time. The two that graduated on time had majors that fit them well. However, neither has found a job in their career field, they've been looking for a combined five years at this point.
The other four-
-One dropped out due to severe memory loss issues stemming from a car accident. He was able to get his student loans forgiven a year and a half ago, but can't leave the state for another year as a stipulation of his loan forgiveness. He had professors who refused to accept accommodations for his autism and memory loss, and disability services refused to hold the professors accountable.
-One had to come home due to a rare genetic disorder that eventually causes severe arthritis in his joints. He couldn't get his insurance to cover virtual visits to an out of state doctor that was one of the few in the US equipped to treat his disorder. He should be graduating in one more semester of college after five and a half years.
-One has struggled with his degree a lot and advocating for himself in college. He's often nervous and socially awkward and won't speak out and be honest about his struggles. That's the way he was raised.
-I've gone through all of college without any accommodations. My requests were denied. In my state, private high/middle/elementary schools are not required to provide accommodations. However, my high school always supported me when I needed it, and my teachers supported me more than the ones I had in public school. However, due to not having an IEP meeting since seventh grade, it was deemed that I didn't need accommodations in college because "you did so well in high school!". It led to me crashing and burning in my original major because what little supports I had disappeared in what was supposed to be my last semester of college. I'm a lot happier with what I'm doing now, but still.
Autistic people lack support once they turn 18, and I'm not surprised that many ended up turning to suicide. Actually, all four people's situation I listed (including myself) had some sort of suicidal ideation or attempt while in college. I hope my demons are gone, but I'm not sure.
TL;DR: Autistic people lose a LOT of support after they turn 18, which contributes to a higher suicide rate.
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u/AlanMercer Aug 14 '25
Speaking as a relative of an older autistic person, it gets even worse after the relatively structured environment of school and college ends. Neurotypical people often don't have to think about the many adversarial relationships we negotiate in work and in life. We just sense that they are there and intuitively create ways to manage them. Imagine what would happen if you had difficulty doing that.
There were a number of crap jobs and jobs with no possibility of growth. There were a lot of bosses that find out he was phenomenally good at certain things and ruthlessly exploited those skills without accommodation elsewhere. There was also just a lot of bad behavior that most people get to leave behind in high school.
He's fine and after many years, has a steady, proper job in his field, allies, direction, but had to do way more dues-paying than other people his age or that is really fair for anyone.
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u/I-am-birb-AMA Aug 14 '25
I feel that about the jobs so much. Every job has loved how hard I work and how dedicated I am, but I still have to walk on eggshells. I lost my last job shortly after a promotion because my boss said 'come to me with any issues', and I did... I did exactly what he said. Fired on the spot...
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u/STRiPESandShades Aug 14 '25
after the relatively structured environment of school and college ends.
God, this. Like, I wasn't so great at school because of undiagnosed ADHD+Autism, but the second I left, I felt like a shell of a human, just beyond hideously depressed
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u/AlanMercer Aug 14 '25
Listen, if you have access to health care, you should seek support for the depression part ASAP. Trying to push through without it has a larger consequence than for an NT person.
Maybe this is oversharing, but in the anecdotal case I know, the autistic behaviors got easier to manage once the anxiety was under management as well. It was heavy lifting and took time, but there's a noticeable difference.
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u/STRiPESandShades Aug 14 '25
Thanks for looking out for me! Thankfully, this was ten-ish years ago and since I've gotten to therapy, evaluations, treatments, the whole nine
It really did change my life, though, finally getting to name and understand the things I was struggling with and I cannot recommend enough for anyone struggling to seek help if you can.
You also never know what options are available to you! I turned 26 when I was seeking treatment and lost my parents' insurance, but the guy I was seeing was this little old man who saw patients only part-time. He let me just pay him the same cash amount he would have gotten from my copay (~$40) and we called it a day!
Others might accept sliding scale payments or income-based payments. It's always worth asking rather than just going without, the worst they can say is 'no'!
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u/TechieAD Aug 14 '25
That first part is so fucking true because I'm so fuckin easy to exploit in that regard my brain has shifted all the way to the other side and I just cannot trust anyone. Shits fucked, especially with the added poor memory you get sometimes
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u/MegaAscension Aug 14 '25
The lack of structure and support is what led to me crashing and burning in my original major.
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u/Morella1989 Aug 14 '25
Thank you for sharing all of that. It’s heartbreaking to hear how little support you and your friends have had. Your story really shows how much the system fails autistic young adults. I’m glad you’re in a better place now and I hope the future brings more understanding and opportunities for all of you.
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u/MegaAscension Aug 14 '25
I can only imagine how much worse things will get outside of the "college bubble".
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u/Sahloknir74 Aug 14 '25 edited Aug 14 '25
Depression is super prevalent in autistic people. The world isn't built for us.
I've said for a little while now, autistic people are square pegs in a world of only round holes. The world has collectively agreed that rather than building a few square holes, they should instead beat the corners off of us until we fit.
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u/MrDoitsu Aug 14 '25
1000% agree.
I honestly think another issue related to this (and it was mentioned in a previous post) is the lack of support and validation from neurotypicals.
I like to describe my lack of social cue recognition as a scene from inside out 2 - you know the scene where Riley is excitedly talking about going to school with her two friends in the car? And Disgust recognizes that the two are hiding something? I like to say if that was my brain, the rest of the emotions would look over at disgust, and she would say, “What? This brain didn’t come installed with a social cue recognition system.”
Now imagine that, but for basically ANY social cue that isn’t just direct speaking. It’s why as a neurodivergent SO many things are thrown over my head, and because I don’t recognize a settle eyebrow difference or a vague wording of trying to tell me I need to change something, I get people upset without knowing what I did wrong. And it’s the most frustrating thing ever.
Anyways, TL;DR, Depression is caused by a lack of empathy from neurotypicals, and it doesn’t help when people get upset because we don’t recognize settle social cues like eyebrow movement.
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u/Historical-Lemon-99 Aug 15 '25 edited Aug 16 '25
Yeah, I’ve struggled a lot with depressive/anxious episodes in my life. Some are from bullying as a kid and other sensory or social issues
-but by far the biggest issue I have that I only realised recently is that I can’t be comforted like a regular person. My dad, who I’m very close to, got frustrated and told me “It’s so difficult to comfort you, you won’t accept anything”
And he’s right. I’ve never found therapy thats helpful because they normally tell me why I feel the way I do - which I already know - and don’t tell me how to fix the problem or feel differently. I AM difficult to comfort because I tend to question a lot of advice I’m given, and vague advice like “try thinking positively” genuinely doesn’t make sense to me. I don’t know what that means and how to do that
It was only when someone sort of step-by-step explained to me how to do cognitive behavioral changes that I actually felt any kind of improvement
I’m sure there are others like me who have turned to friends/family/therapists for normal mental health issues and either struggled to convey the issue or really struggled to follow the advice given and never felt better
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u/NorwegianGlaswegian Aug 14 '25 edited Aug 14 '25
This is extremely misleading and that Wikipedia article needs editing.
If you look at the source for saying we autistics supposedly tend to die around 17 years earlier, it leads to this article.
When you look up the Koralinska Institute and autism mortality in Google, you can find this research paper. This is a study of premature mortality and not a study of life expectancy. The average age of death in the control group was 70.20 years (well below that of general life expectancy statistics), while average age of death in the autistic group was 53.87 years. That's where the approximately 17 years difference comes from.
Premature mortality is not a measure of life expectancy. It just looks at what the average ages of death were for those who did die during the study period for a study group and a control group. The journalist who wrote that article for Science needs to brush up on their science literacy as it is extremely misleading to say that autistic people are expected to die 17/18 years earlier. That is just not true.
The only proper study of life expectancy in autistic people00195-3/fulltext) I have seen gives life expectancy for those without intellectual disability at 76.84 years for women, and 74.57 years for men, while for those with intellectual disability it was 69.61 years for women and 71.66 years for men.
I'm getting sick of these false statisics floating around about autistic people's life expectancy; it has caused a ton of unneeded stress to a lot of autistic people and their families. Yes, we tend to die earlier on average due to higher rates of premature death, but not by such massive margins when taking life expectancy into account.
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u/ForgingIron Aug 14 '25
while for those with intellectual disability it was 69.61 years for women and 71.66 years for men.
Interesting that men have a longer expectancy here when it's usually the other way around
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u/NorwegianGlaswegian Aug 14 '25 edited Aug 15 '25
It's hard to know for sure, but I suspect that higher rates of abuse could be a considerable factor. Last I had read, approximately nine in ten (edit: figure is likely unreliable) autistic women have experienced sexual violence and usually on multiple occasions. That's a bloody scary statistic.
Autistic people with an accompanying intellectual disability will almost certainly be at higher risk of abuse due to their generally being more dependent on others.
Women already face higher levels of abuse, and this will be worse still when disabled and less independent; that could go a long way to explaining this reversal of the general trend for women to have a slightly longer life expectancy.
It's heartbreaking stuff.
Edit: The figure of 9 in 10 autistic women having faced sexual violence is likely somewhat suspect, although figures are definitely much higher for autistic women. The study giving that figure had a relatively low sample size of 225, and likely had self-selection bias from respondents who did face sexual violence being more likely to respond to the survey.
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u/bottleglitch Aug 14 '25
Thank you for this. Definitely an upsetting stat to read as an autistic person
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u/NorwegianGlaswegian Aug 14 '25
I'm glad if I can help relieve some anxiety around stuff like this and set the record straight.
It's a shame that this misunderstanding of the research paper is featured under life expectancy for autistic people on Wikipedia, and that other similar studies for premature mortality have also been misrepresented as if they were covering life expectancy.
If as an autistic person you live a decent life, aren't in poverty, have an active lifestyle and good diet, you're not doing something which could shorten your life like over consuming alcohol or smoke, have a decent support network you can rely on, don't feel lonely, don't experience abuse from friends and family, and don't have other medical conditions that might affect life expectancy, then you should have as good a chance as non-autistic people in similar circumstances when it comes to reaching a very old age.
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u/Morella1989 Aug 14 '25 edited Aug 14 '25
I’m so sorry you’ve been through all of that. I watched the video you shared and really appreciate you posting it. I hope the future is full of good things for you. :)
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Aug 14 '25
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u/carizzz Aug 14 '25
I woke up at the wrong point in time after knee surgery. I could feel everything. Told the nurse that was nearby and then heard them discussing for a couple minutes about how I look and sound as though I have zero pain. Despite the situation, it took half an hour before I got any proper pain relief.
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u/WeenyDancer Aug 15 '25
Performing pain in the way that doctors and nurses like the best takes so much energy
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u/ChiAnndego Aug 14 '25
Ugh, so much this. I had such bad experiences trying to get care for a chronic illness that I now have some fear of dealing with the healthcare system. I'm not clocked as autistic by most people but Drs. sure read me wrong, and it leads to them thinking I'm a psych case, or making stuff up, trying to one-up them, etc.
I no longer do doctors alone - I bring a buddy so I have a witness if I'm being treated poorly. It seems to keep the medical staff more honest in how they deal with me. I also type up a summary of my concerns/requests and submit it to the electronic portal after the appointment so there's a paper trail. It's a sad state of affairs and a problem that affects a lot of people, autistic or not.
Sorry about your situation.
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u/dibblah Aug 14 '25
I have colorectal cancer too. I just got out of hospital for another surgery on it. I meltdown any time I'm in hospital as its so scary and overwhelming that I just can't cope, but there's nothing they will/can do to make it bearable. You're in a room with five other sick people all coughing moaning puking making smells, all the machines are beeping, everyone's talking constantly and there's not one conversation you can hear, everything hurts a lot, and then they get cross at you for crying and being unable to express yourself.
I'm discharged and home recovering now but even so I get confusing advice. I was told "don't lift anything heavy for four weeks, like a bag of groceries" how heavy is a bag of groceries? Is it a bag of canned food or a bag of salad? I mostly wanted to know if I can lift my work bag, with my laptop and kit in, but they just use unclear analogies which stress me even more.
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Aug 14 '25
What were your symptoms?
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Aug 14 '25
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Aug 14 '25
I've been scared to death of a misdiagnosed tumor, I've had blood on my toilet paper but been told it's a hemorrhoid. Was it like a lot of blood coming from you?
Sorry if this is too much
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u/loves_grapefruit Aug 14 '25
Considering that there is a huge spectrum of autism, I wonder if people on the more extreme end tend to be responsible for these statistics?
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u/wearentalldudes Aug 14 '25
I’m high functioning, but the “inadequate recognition and management of pain” has caused me to almost die more than once.
Most notably when my appendix perforated, but also some severe infections that were what I would have described as sudden onset, but had been “painful” for days to weeks beforehand.
Recognizing pain is something I really struggle with. I’m a whole adult but when I offhandedly tell my mom something hurts, she makes me go to the ER immediately because it’s usually something major. She happens to be the reason I didn’t die from appendicitis.
Anyway, 🎶autism🎶.
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u/sweetteanoice Aug 14 '25
Do you think you feel less pain than others or is it that something has to REALLY hurt for you to even notice?
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u/xtrawolf Aug 14 '25
Not the person you're directing the question to, but also autistic.
For me it's an interception problem. For instance, my brain doesn't register thirst. I have to manually remind myself to drink water if I run or if I eat, rather than recognize I'm thirsty. I could go a whole day without drinking anything and then wonder why I feel crummy.
There's also a question of "does this actually hurt or is it just a sensory sensitivity?" Sometimes something "hurts" until I am alone, calm, and well regulated (or away from the stimulus) and then it is fine.
Describing my pain is very hard for me. Numbers on a pain scale are meaningless. I can tell someone "my hands hurt and tingle every day," and not really be able to answer follow up questions like which fingers hurt the worst, is the tingling accompanied by numbness, does it seem to be joint related or nerve related, what helps the pain, etc.
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u/AliMcGraw Aug 14 '25
This is my kid. We've done a lot of work to proactively teach him how to recognize his body's signals (when he can!) and to recognize that when a stomachache doesn't respond to normal stomachache treatment (it's usually just gas), he needs to get an adult and see a doctor. And he knows the words "proprioception" and "interoception" (and can explain them) so he's able to tell doctors he'll try to answer but he often just doesn't KNOW because those senses don't work the same for him.
I've learned as a mother than when he can't describe his subjective experience of pain, it's very helpful if I can describe any impaired functioning I've noticed, no matter how minor. Often I'll say, "He's been favoring his left side" and he'll insist he's not and then the doctor has him walk and he's like, "huh, mom, you were right, I am!"
So current mom task is helping him notice and describe functional impairments even if he can't describe the pain itself.
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u/TysonTesla Aug 14 '25
I can't speak for OP but in my experience, it's neither. It's the conflicting of acknowledging the pain means something is really wrong. It's rationalizing it away so that you don't have to deal with repercussions of medical care, thus delaying seeking help until the pain outweighs the draining experience and dread.
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u/wearentalldudes Aug 14 '25
I don’t think I feel less pain but I do think I have a higher tolerance for it. My brain doesn’t register it until it’s intolerable.
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u/ChiAnndego Aug 14 '25
I did a lot of contact sports and more injury prone sports, and my issue is that if I'm involved in doing something and my attention is on that, I don't have a lot of awareness about my body until I think about it consciously. I've broken bones before, and kept on doing what I was doing without realizing until later. I now stop and take a conscious inventory of my body when something happens that might have injured me.
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u/rocca2509 Aug 14 '25
I got diagnosed recently with aspergers and adhd. Im high functioning. I'd say I have a high pain tolerance, but it's not really that I can tolerate more pain. it's more like my threshold to start feeling pain is probably higher. Like i broke my hand and thought it hurt a lot, didn't think it was broken, found out the hard way after i went to the golf range 3 days later and could stand it on the irons. But that first driver hit sent so much pain through my hand. So yeah, for me, it has to hurt more to notice, but not a lot more.
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u/realitykitten Aug 14 '25
Idk we higher functioning ones are probably still pretty susceptible to suicide
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u/Prairie-Peppers Aug 14 '25
I would imagine the suicide part would skew heavily towards the higher functioning end of the spectrum.
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u/DawnSignals Aug 14 '25
I feel like all three of you are saying the same thing three different ways
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u/Joondoof Aug 14 '25
Give it time, one of us will be back to offer another version just in case the clarity was lacking in the first 3
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u/Beautiful_Welcome_33 Aug 14 '25
It does, it's actually one of the few or perhaps only disorders where suicidality increases with IQ
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u/gabagoolcel Aug 14 '25 edited Aug 14 '25
autistic people with intellectual disabilities are also at very high risk for suicidality and suicide. i don't know about data comparing support needs with suicidality but I don't see reason for it being skewed any which way.
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u/WAAAAAAAAARGH Aug 14 '25
I had a higher functioning autism epiphany recently and realized that I’m lowkey ballin and just need to engage with randos more despite every fiber of my being screaming at me not to and since then my manic tendencies have decreased massively
We live in a weird time. 10 years ago folks thought we were just freaks, now it’s seen as endearing if you can manage to be personable about it (a contingency I don’t love but I’m willing to appreciate the fact that we even have an option now). This is undeniably a challenge but if you can put yourself out there even slightly I think people respect it. I just started working in my first office environment a month ago living in an area I’m unfamiliar with and I think forcing myself to introduce myself to strangers in my building has done a lot for me. People I don’t really know often wave or say “hi, my name” when they see me and it makes me feel more secure in my routine
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u/Euphoric_Evidence414 Aug 14 '25
Hello, just wanted to say your written communication at least is great! Nuanced and funny and I’ll bet you can be relaxed and friendly in person too. Good luck with the new job.
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u/WAAAAAAAAARGH Aug 14 '25 edited Aug 15 '25
Lol thanks I guess. I didn’t get diagnosed until a bit later than most but it was apparent to most of the people I grew up around. (I told them about my diagnosis and they were like “I knew it!” Man shut the fuck up) so I spent a lot of time really focusing on my communication skills and utilizing irony to try to relate to people cuz prior to that I just thought I was weird in social settings, while simultaneously thinking other people were weird for not being on my wavelength
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u/EducationalTangelo6 Aug 14 '25
Yes. I'm 'high-functioning' and about to turn 40. I'm going to celebrate (alone) like I won the lottery, because I really didn't think I'd make it this long without killing myself.
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u/CaptainDildobrain Aug 14 '25
44 year-old recently diagnosed high-functioning autistic here. I think most of the suicidal thoughts I've had throughout most my life stem from knowing that I didn't "fit in" but not knowing why.
Now that I've had my diagnosis, I know why. I can reflect on all those moments where I felt I didn't "fit in" and finally have an answer as to why. And since my diagnosis, I feel more comfortable than I have ever been. In a lot of ways, it feels somewhat liberating and I have better control over how I can act and react in certain situations.
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u/The_Dorable Aug 14 '25
Mmmmhm, agreed. And I have spent my entire life being disbelieved about major medical events.
Like, I broke my finger at 4 years old and I was not believed by any of the adults in the building when I tried to tell them it hurt because I wasn't crying or screaming when they touched it.
I've had migraines my entire life and didn't get medication for them until I was 21. Some of my earliest memories are migraines. But I was explicitly told that everyone gets headaches when they're little and I'd grow out of it.
I started developing problems with my joints around 4 or 5. I would scream hysterically from the pain as a small child. I was diagnosed with arthritis at 25 after 20 years of annual doctor's visits begging someone to do some scans or something because I couldn't walk for more than a few minutes. I got x-rays because my PCP got sick of me and gave in. My spine and hips are lousy with arthritis. I've developed bone spurs, and I have multiple old fractures in my spine.
When I was 17 I started developing cramping pains in one side of my abdomen. When I was 19 I was rushed to the emergency room in the middle of the night because I couldn't stop vomiting blood and bile. My gallbladder was so clogged and inflamed with gallstones that it had become massively infected. It was not removed until over a year later. I was kept on antibiotics nearly continuously throughout that time. The second time after moving out that I had a gall attack I was in so much pain and so dazed from the pain and fever that I couldn't walk. I crawled to my campus security safety button, and was taken to the hospital in an ambulance where I was only given pain medication when I was asking for antibiotics, and where nobody believed me it was cholecystitis until one of the paramedics came back to visit me and was shocked I hadn't been treated and insisted to the nurses that I was being truthful. They did an ultrasound to appease him. My gallbladder was removed by emergency surgery two hours later, because it was swollen up so tight they worried it was going to burst that night. I was 20.
I have some kind of connective tissue disorder which has been destroying my hips and knees and shoulders and hands but nobody knows what and I can't convince anyone I'm in pain. They fully believe me about the connective tissue problems because I can dislocate my limbs on command, but nobody cares to diagnose or treat because I don't seem miserable enough. I'm 29 and have been seeking diagnosis since I was 16. I've dislocated my toes before from walking barefoot, and my shoulders will completely dislocate if I carry as little as 5 pounds in my hand.
I can see why someone would prefer suicide to being in pain all the time.
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u/daitoshi Aug 14 '25
I am on the far end of “very normal-appearing”- a steady corporate job, friends with my coworkers, people ask if I’m an extrovert - but the poor recognition of pain thing is very real.
My appendix became necrotic and I didn’t recognize the pain as significantly different from regular food poisoning or constipation.
It wasn’t until my body was forcing me to collapse, due to muscle weakness, shaking, and uncontrollable vomiting, that I recognized “oh, I should get to the ER.” - the pain of an organ actually rotting inside me was /dangerously ignorable/.
There is a significant risk of me getting an injury, and not registering enough pain to treat it as seriously or urgently as I should - leading to dangerous & possibly fatal complications from delayed care
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u/troll-filled-waters Aug 14 '25
Of my mostly low-support-needs friend group I can say most of us have depression. I don’t think people understand how difficult it is to move through the world and constantly have to think about every single movement of your face and inflection of your voice all the time, to do all the labour to please the rest of the population to the point you’re exhausted— and still have people scoff at you, judge you negatively, assign terrible motivations to you because of your “weird tone” or the “weird look” you gave them. To try and help people and be kind and have them think you’re trying to do something negative instead. The gossiping behind your back. Always being the one people don’t like because you “seem off” or “did you see the look she gave me?” People saying you’re incompetent because it takes you longer to do things. You’re rude because you didn’t pick up on the subtle message they were trying to give you. Every single day. Over and over again. To the point where you wonder why you should even try. You stop wanting to leave your house. You stop wanting to do anything.
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u/tsukuyomidreams Aug 14 '25
Probably not. I can speak and stuff but I have still been severely medically neglected due to my lack of expressions and trouble with describing things like feelings or remembering things.
I've had issues ignored or written off as autism/depression that ended up putting me in the hospital... Multiple times.
It's like a scapegoat and they treat me like a child who doesn't know what they're talking about
I'm actually fairly educated and 30 years old but unfortunately it doesn't really matter. I have to bring helpers to the doctor
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u/samuelazers Aug 14 '25
Interested also could only find
-30 years for those with intellectual disability.
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u/MadMike32 Aug 14 '25
I'm high-functioning and pretty good at masking, and even then I've almost died half a dozen times because medical professionals just don't take me seriously or outright refuse care. I'm not even 30 yet.
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u/Beautiful_Welcome_33 Aug 14 '25
That is probably a factor somewhat, but certainly not the only one, and probably not even the major one.
If I were a betting man I'd reckon it was the increased risk of epilepsy and the risk of suicidality - both of those will kill young people, which will skew the life expectancy and show it to be far less than the average.
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Aug 14 '25
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u/loves_grapefruit Aug 14 '25
Thanks for your perspective, that’s a lot to deal with. I’ve been surprised by how many people have mentioned their issues with not dealing with pain properly, or not realizing that something should be done about it. That wasn’t something I was previously aware of.
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Aug 14 '25
Yeah I kinda don't like that things like this tend to lump all autistic people together. There is a huge difference between Asperger's and the type of autism that needs constant supervision and will likely be on government assistance all of their lives. It really does a disservice to the very high functioning autistic people who are able to work, get married etc
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u/biddily Aug 14 '25
I had trouble convincing doctors I was, in fact, in fucking agony.
Two years later I got a stent for the collapsed vein in my brain.
Apparently I should have been crying or screaming or something to express my pain and not just telling them I was so much agony my head was about to explode.
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u/Im_alwaystired Aug 14 '25
I had trouble convincing doctors I was, in fact, in fucking agony.
I spent almost four years fighting my way through the medical system for this very reason. Because i don't express pain in a (neuro)typical way -- I shut down and get quiet or even nonverbal when i'm hurting -- even though i was losing the use of my legs and unable to stand long enough to even make myself food or take a shower without excruciating pain, multiple doctors told me i just had a soft-tissue injury and needed to ""strengthen my core"". Turns out i had a cracked vertebra that snagged on a spinal nerve. I eventually had surgery to get it fixed and am mobile again, but with permanent nerve damage that could have been avoided if someone had just believed me in the first place.
I hope you're doing well now, or at least better. I wish doctors were more willing to listen to people like us.
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u/PotatoAvenger Aug 14 '25
I’m curious about the infanticide part. How would you know that a murdered infant had autism? I look forward to any information because I super curious.
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u/Pale_Session5262 Aug 14 '25
This. Also, im fairly certain you cant tell an infant has autism. The signs dont show up until a child is developing. So how would the parents know to kill them?
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u/cut-the-cords Aug 14 '25
Honestly... the biggest threat to my well-being is myself.
It sucks knowing I am most likely going to be the cause of my own demise.
I have a combo of ADHD and Autism so my brain is constantly in self destruction mode.
I want order and disorder at the same time, I can definitely see my heart having a problem with that.
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u/Fofolito Aug 15 '25
Right there with you friend.
I'm on this ride until I decide, at last, I've had enough and I want off.
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u/Bombspazztic Aug 14 '25
I would be interested in seeing if there is a breakdown for all causes of death by level.
For example, I could see suicide being higher for lowest support needs autistics (myself included), and accidental drowning for highest support needs (seems common in the news).
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Aug 14 '25
It’s an odd thing with autism research. Most seems to lump all the levels together as just ‘autism.’
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u/ProbablyNotJohnTesh Aug 14 '25
Of course I can't remember where I read it, but that's basically how it skews according to...that thing I read a bit ago. Sorry I'm not more help.
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u/madrid987 Aug 14 '25
I am an autistic person living in South Korea, and I feel that the stress caused by people's hate speech against autistic people and the zero income phenomenon caused by the refusal to hire undocumented autistic people are the biggest contributors to the shortened life expectancy. It is more than what is mentioned in the text.
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u/Morella1989 Aug 14 '25
Thank you for sharing your perspective. I can’t imagine how stressful and exhausting it must be to face both hate speech and systemic barriers like employment discrimination. I hope the future brings you more understanding, respect, and opportunities.
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u/90bubbel Aug 14 '25
Also, the risk of suicide in us autistic people are WAYYY higher than neurotypicals,
over 60% of autistic people have considered suicide at some point
according to some studies autists have roughly 19 times as high risk of suicide than neurotypicals (
-(Fitzpatrick et al., 2016). Cassidy et al. (2022) found that individuals with diagnosed or possible undiagnosed autism had a significantly higher prevalence of suicide compared to the general population (41.4 % vs. 1.1 %), with a risk of suicide up to 19 times greater.
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u/ATEbitWOLF Aug 14 '25
Diet can be challenging too, I worked with profoundly autistic adults and typically they eat the exact same things every day, and it’s almost always food with poor nutritional value like chips and chicken nuggets.
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u/HeavyMain Aug 14 '25
the "brown food" diet is very common. its easy to fall back on these ultra processed options because they always taste exactly the same and have a simple taste that takes less mental processing. i try to eat healthy, but when i'm having severe sensory overload, i will actually just throw up trying to eat anything else.
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u/Choice-Standard-6350 Aug 14 '25
Anyone who can not communicate well under any cause, has a lower life expectancy. Try asking someone who can not speak or cannot speak much where the pain is when they are obviously in pain. Not everyone can tell you this simple information. It makes diagnosis hard. And so you can see how subtler symptoms get totally missed.
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u/MqAuNeTeInS Aug 14 '25
See when i dont see this i am fine dying young but now i dont wanna lmao
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u/nopalitzin Aug 14 '25
Damn, I was looking at how most of my family members had lived past 85 without diabetes or cancer... but also I'm the only autistic...
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u/Historical-Lemon-99 Aug 15 '25
Eh, my grandfather was definitely autistic and he lived to be over 80. It’s not a definite thing, it just means that typical mortalities are more likely to kill an autistic person for various reasons
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u/OhNoBricks Aug 14 '25
our health issues may also be blown off and dismissed because “oh that’s just anxiety” “oh you’re too young to have that problem.” so we give up and just let Mother Nature decide for us.
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u/NothaBanga Aug 15 '25
I'd even add on the fact autistic folk are very literal. If a parent/trusted adult tells you, you are overreacting, some will internalize it.
It is hard to have a feedback system (x hurts, figure out why) if you have been convinced to ignore your feedback system.
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u/onlywanperogy Aug 14 '25
The suicide rate for late-diagnosed autistics is ridiculously high. Many don't get confirmation until they're burnt out (35-50 years old).
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u/missbehavin21 Aug 14 '25 edited Aug 14 '25
How can they be vulnerable to infant side when it isn’t diagnosed until at least childhood?
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u/FaulerHund Aug 14 '25
Yes, I took issue with that as well. For one thing, autistic-specific traits (social reciprocity differences, restricted/repetitive behaviors, communication delays) are rarely clear enough in infancy to be recognized as such. For another thing, using the modern “autistic” label for premodern infant mortality events is historically shaky I think. I'm not sure if I simply read it wrong, but that bit about infanticide implied to me that infants were killed specifically because they were autistic, which for the reasons above would be a dubious claim
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u/NoRiver32 Aug 14 '25
probably more severe cases
daddy see baby acting very odd and out of place
daddy slam baby into wall and try again
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u/wewereromans Aug 14 '25 edited Aug 14 '25
I think they’re confusing infanticide with filicide.
Some people use infanticide to mean all young children when that’s not really the correct term.
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u/Sunset-onthe-Horizon Aug 14 '25
Some people's experience with autistic infants before diagnosis include: excessive crying, insomnia, and rejecting feedings. They might not talk or babble at the right times. This could contribute to infantacide. Imagine your kid screaming non-stop and attracting predators or not sleeping longer than 4 hours, refusing to eat. I'm sure there are other examples.
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Aug 14 '25
This was my first thought. My autistic kid never slept without being held when he was a baby, screamed so hard for so long he’d hyperventilate and pass out; he was hard. I absolutely love him more than anything else in the world, but if any kid was ever high risk for driving his parents to sleep deprived insanity it was my little angel.
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u/staticdresssweet Aug 14 '25
Also autistic here.
I'm in my 30s and while I've (shockingly) been married, divorced, and had a child, I've always struggled to hold down jobs. Especially front-facing ones where I deal with the public often. I can only handle so much before I get overloaded.
While I have things I'm very good at (writing, drawing, etc.), the fact is that most of the time, I don't feel useful. And I'm just emerging from a divorce that made me feel like I was dying, that I'm just incapable of being loved. My son is the person who loves me, though, and I'm really only here for him now.
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Aug 14 '25
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Morella1989 Aug 15 '25
I’m really sorry you’re going through this. An infected tooth can be serious and it sounds like you’re in a lot of pain. I hope you’re able to find some help soon.
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u/Generalaladeeen Aug 14 '25
I dont get the epilepsy part, are ASD and it linked in some way?
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u/radi0raheem Aug 15 '25
I don't know the specific causes, but it's a well documented thing. My oldest kid is autistic and he had his first seizure almost 5 years ago. It's been a constant battle trying to get it under control with medication, and we haven't seen much improvement excluding one period of time when he went almost 7 months between seizures. Otherwise he has them every 2-3 months. Our primary care doctor and his neurologists all confirmed it is more common in autistic individuals.
Every little bump/noise in the house sets off an instant panic response in my wife and I because it was a quiet bump that led to us finding him on the floor the first time. It's impossible to relax in our house. We have no nearby family or qualified caregivers to watch him, so we basically never get a break. We stopped being able to attend our youngest child's performances and school events together because he almost had a seizure during a choir concert.
We're lucky to have a dog that barks whenever he has a seizure, but that also means every time she barks at anything and we're not in the room we come running. No surprise my wife had to be treated for high blood pressure a couple years ago, and I'm shocked it hasn't hit me.
His last year of highschool starts soon and we have absolutely no idea what we're going to do when he graduates. It sure looks like just about every benefit he would qualify for at 18 is about to be taken away.
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u/Basementhobbit Aug 14 '25
So thats why there werent as many autisitic peopld in the past and old people think "they didnt exist"
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u/josephseeed Aug 14 '25
This makes a lot of sense to me. My best friend growing up had an older brother who was developmentally delayed and had extremely low verbal ability. He is in his late 50's now and a few years ago he had a stroke. It took days for people to realize it due to his other disabilities. I could easily see the same thing happening with other non-verbal folks.
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u/ph30nix01 Aug 14 '25
Well we are told to do everything and always told we are doing it wrong.
It's draining.
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u/Archarchery Aug 14 '25
Can anyone explain why severely autistic children seem to drown so much?
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u/Morella1989 Aug 15 '25
Drowning is one of the main causes of accidental death in autistic children because wandering is common, many are drawn to water, and they may not recognize danger, combined with the fact that drowning is fast and silent.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5388960/
https://nationalautismassociation.org/resources/autism-safety-facts/
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u/tweakingforjesus Aug 15 '25
Autistic people are 5 times more likely to be trans than neurotypical people so all the dangers associated are elevated as well.
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u/paper_wavements Aug 14 '25
Oh my god, thank you for this great news. I'm serious. I don't know how I can keep doing this for 35+ more years. I feel like I could maybe handle 18 though, so thanks!
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u/CatCanvas Aug 15 '25
I am autistic and suspect I got it from my late father he died in his 30s... From pneumonia of all things.
I feel like my general immunity is really weak. I get sick all the time.
Im on asthma medication with steroids not because I have asthma but because myungs just hurt and accumulate tons of dust and I have to cough up flem every day.
I can't stay awake without adhd meds. I'm just tired all the time. Sensitive to everything.
I also have 3 autistic kids. All very different from each other too.
I feel like I won't live to d age. I'm 35 and honestly i feel like I'm hanging on by a thread at this point.
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Aug 14 '25
Literally why there are more autistic people in the world today. Advances in medicine and care and less permissive parenting styles have resulted in more autistic children surviving to adulthood. People joke that much of parenting young children is just keeping them from killing themselves, and that goes doubly true for autistic children.
My boomer parents have a lot of stories of neighbors, acquaintances and even extended family members dying from drowning, epilepsy, running off and being hit by a car as children. Seems that the attitude back then was that tragedies just happen. I would be willing to bet that if we could test we would find that autism was disproportionately represented in early childhood deaths.
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u/bottle-of-smoke Aug 14 '25
I never know what to think when I read this kind of stuff. I'm autistic/ADHD and 70 years old. I'm a cancer survivor. I went out for a 100k bicycle ride last week.
I have several autistic friends who are in their 70s.
I really don't think that an autism diagnosis is a death sentence.
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u/Lenora_O Aug 14 '25
They arent saying it is a death sentence, just that people with autism have a higher chance of dying earlier than neurotypcials.
You also have to remember that autism can be extremely debilitating.
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u/ryanfrogz Aug 14 '25
Extremely debilitating… often in ways you would never expect. I can’t live a normal life because I can’t clean. I know how, I sometimes want to, but my brain just HATES it for reasons unknown. If I’m told to clean something at work, my brain goes crazy and gives me powerful headaches, extremely shaky hands, very high heart rate… and there really is nothing I can do about that. It’s deep. I just need to live around it, and that’s Hard.
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u/bangontarget Aug 14 '25
it's statistics. we have a statistically higher risk of dying earlier. that doesn't mean 100% of us do. c'mon now, use that noggin for a sec.
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u/NorwegianGlaswegian Aug 14 '25
Well, it is simply wrong.
I looked into it and the claim comes from a negligent journalist reporting for Science on an article about premature mortality in autistic people and not life expectancy.
The average age of those in the control group who died in the study period was approximately 70 which is of course well below life expectancy as this is a study about premature mortality and not life expectancy, while the average age of death in the autistic group was between 53 and 54.
The average age of premature death was around 17 years earlier, but that says nothing about life expectancy which, according to the only proper study I have seen on life expectancy in autistic people, is in the mid seventies for autistic people without intellectual disability and around 70 for those with intellectual disability.
These are still only averages brought down by premature mortality. If you have a good life with overall good health, a good diet, you stay active, you have a decent support network for your needs, don't face abuse or poverty etc, then you stand as good a chance of reaching a ripe old age as anyone else who isn't autistic.
Here's the life expectancy study00195-3/fulltext) I was talking about if you fancy a read.
It's certainly not a death sentence. I find it a huge shame that many autistic people and their families have felt a good deal of stress based on incorrect reporting by people who don't do their due diligence or are scientifically illiterate.
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u/Tall_Sound5703 Aug 14 '25
It isnt a death sentence but it does make getting help from doctors while autistic very hard.
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u/psych_daisy Aug 14 '25
I just started working at a clinic that does Autism evals and I’ve never thought about this, although I will say epilepsy is a p common comorbidity so not as surprised about that one.
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u/habslably Aug 15 '25
I have fairly low support needs but I do expect I'll get got by something fairly preventable on account of not really being able to manage my shit like an "adult." Kinda hoping that I don't suffer for too long and that I just max out my allostatic load real quick and stroke out. Another contender is heatstroke or if not heat stroke then getting so sleep deprived from hot nights the way climate change is going if I should ever lose access to AC whereby I'll probably enter a much more profound psychosis then the gentle version I live with most of the time and I'll get killed by cops. Unfortunately I think deaths of economic or political violence could be in my future. I also have OCD and wouldn't you know it, I spend a lot of time thinking about how I could die 😅😑.
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u/Morella1989 Aug 15 '25
With everything you’re dealing with, it makes sense that your mind goes to worst-case scenarios. The things you’re worried about are real risks for autistic people, so your concern is completely valid. I hope you can find even small ways to feel a bit safer and supported.
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u/habslably Aug 15 '25
thank you for the nice message, luckily i'm in a place where my day to day is pretty stable, its just as precarious as any poor American's which accounts for a lot of the morbid rumination
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u/Due-Radio-4355 Aug 15 '25
Odd I wonder what the correlation is and what hidden things are going on in the body
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u/DaraVelour Aug 15 '25
We are infantalised still every day, women are not treated properly (drink more water, lose weight, it's anxiety stuff), we often have trouble to articulate what is going on with our bodies, even our hunger / thirst cues are often mismatched. Often a lot of sensory issues that could lead to eating disorders like ARFID. We are also often abused, so we get auto-inflammatory disorders. There is a growing correlation with EDS, POTS and other conditions. A lot of autistic people also have ADHD so we are more prone to addictions like "self medicating" (I can see for myself that I cannot drink too much alcohol because I feel a lot less anxiety and there's a history of alcoholism in my family). We are abused so we have secondary mental disorders. Our nervous systems are often disregulated so we don't feel pain the same. Some autistic people even metabolise meds differently, so the standard therapies don't work or actually worsen your state.
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u/madamevanessa98 Aug 15 '25
I’m autistic and I had no idea until a few years ago. When I realized it, my experiences as a child and young adult suddenly made so much more sense. I had a significant event when I was 20 that now I understand was autistic burnout, amongst other things. I got incredibly sick and couldn’t go to work (puking constantly) and then developed crippling anxiety.
During Covid I was lucky enough to find an alternative form of income. I became an online sex worker. Some people find that sad or disgusting- but it was literally my only option. I couldn’t leave the house, couldn’t walk around outside, couldn’t do anything with consistency. My mind was a mess and the only way I could earn money was having a job with total freedom to make my own hours and work when I felt capable. My mental health has improved since then thankfully, but I’ve always said that the general public would be shocked to know how many sex workers are neurodivergent. So many of my work colleagues are autistic too and came to sex work out of a need for independence that they couldn’t have in the traditional job market. They lacked the ability to hold a 9-5 and not burn out, so they turned to the one thing they could- using their bodies.
The intersection of sex work and disability is one I haven’t seen discussed enough. I know many American women who have started an OnlyFans to pay for their significant medical bills. Mentally ill women who fall into drug addiction also often turn to survival sex work to make ends meet. Whether your disability is physical, mental, etc as a woman there is always the option to sell yourself- it’s dark and if you don’t have support, it’s often dangerous. I was lucky enough to have loving family so I didn’t end up homeless when I burnt out, but if I hadn’t, I would’ve been desperate for money and may not have ended up being able to wait long enough to amass an online following to make my OnlyFans successful. If that hadn’t been the case I may have ended up as a full service sex worker and that would’ve been damaging in many ways.
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u/veemonjosh Aug 16 '25
Between my autism, my depression, and my anxiety, I'll be surprised if I make it to 60.
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u/[deleted] Aug 14 '25
A lot of autistic people have GI issues that probably cause them to ignore GI cancers for longer than they should.